GOP stance on ACA based solely on politics

One of the Republicans' most basic laments about the Affordable Care Act ("Obamacare") is that there should be less government interference with the free market system of health care and insurance. But they have no problem talking out of the other side of their collective mouths to criticize the ACA. They complain that people...

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seacoastonline.com

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Posted Apr. 22, 2014 at 2:00 AM

Posted Apr. 22, 2014 at 2:00 AM

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April 20 — To the Editor:

One of the Republicans' most basic laments about the Affordable Care Act ("Obamacare") is that there should be less government interference with the free market system of health care and insurance. But they have no problem talking out of the other side of their collective mouths to criticize the ACA. They complain that people have had their old insurance canceled, which has happened, partly due to controls in the ACA like eliminating lifetime caps, and they claim prices have gone up, which is largely untrue. But the basic point is that before the ACA, in a free insurance market, people regularly had insurance canceled and anyone with any sense of what has happened to insurance rates knows that they regularly were increased.

I understand liberals like me complaining that the ACA did not go far enough in instituting controls on the health insurance market, but it's a little strange to hear Republicans attacking the law because it interferes with the free market and then also complaining because it allows insurance companies to continue free-market activities like canceling policies or raising prices.

And then there is the Republicans' fact-bending claim that the ACA takes money away from Medicare. This relates to Medicare Advantage plans created in the Bush administration because, the Republicans claimed, substituting commercial insurance for existing Medicare would produce free-market competition and lower costs. Despite that claim, the law provided for "startup" subsidies from the federal government to the commercial insurers who offered these plans. Medicare Advantage has been more expensive for the federal government than basic Medicare and all that the ACA does is remove some of the excessive federal subsidy — government payments to commercial insurance companies. So the Republicans apparently want the government to subsidize the "free market" that costs more than the government-operated Medicare insurance.

These intellectual inconsistencies demonstrate that the Republican opposition to the ACA is based on politics, not principle. What a surprise!